January 24 (Tivet 28) - Matthew 14

Tivet is the Biblical month. The New Moon and new Biblical month of Shevat is anticipated to start on Monday. Be looking in the Heavens for His Handiwork and His tell signs of the days, months, years and seasons! It is told in history that For thirty-seven days, Moshe spoke these words of Deuteronomy to all Israel. He began the first of Shevat and ended the seventh of Adar. His first words were: "You have dwelt long enough on this mountain. Turn and take your journey ..." His concluding words were: "There is none like G-d ... Fortunate are you, O Israel: Who is like you! O People delivered by the LORD, the Shield of your help, Who is the Sword of your grandeur; your foes will try to deceive you, but you will trample their haughty ones." This upcoming month of Shevat is therefore well suited for renewed inspiration in the study of His WORD and to move on past the things that so easily beset ... get off this mountain and MOVE!

LORD, Save me!

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S - Scripture: Matthew 14:1-36

Here is something you would find in one of those gorey, bloody movies ... a king apparently having an affair with his brother's wife ... the king's neice dancing before him for his birthday and pleasing him he asks her what she wants and he will give it to her and she asked for the head of John the Baptist on a platter. After the head is given to her on a platter she carries it home to her mother who had instructed her to ask for this thing ... can you put yourself there and feel and see the happenings of this night??

Afterwards the disciples of John come and take him and bury him and run to tell his cousin, Yehoshua (Jesus) who removes himself to the desert to be alone, but the multitudes follow him giving him no time to mourn or grieve and this is said of him:

And Jesus went forth, and saw a great multitude, and was moved with compassion toward them, and he healed their sick. v.14

In the midst of his own grief and sorry he was moved with compassion for others and then he feeds the 5,000 men (plus women and children) with 5 loaves and 2 fishes ... with 12 baskets of leftovers!!

Finally he sends everyone away, including those closest to him and he "he went up into a mountain apart to pray" v.23

It was now about 3 o'clock in the morning and the disciples were in the boat in the sea awaiting Jesus who had gone in to the mountains to pray and "the wind was contrary" and tossing the boat about.

There was a violent agitation and stream of air that night as Jesus prayed on the mountain. Can you imagine ... Think of all the happenings of the day ... John the Baptist ... Jesus trying to find a quiet place in the desert to pray and the multitudes ... everything pressing in on him ... and finally he gets alone to pray ... you can imagine the heaviness and agitation of the air that night ...

If you remember a few chapters back in Chapter 8:26-27 the story of Jesus in the boat with the disciples on that night "Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm. But the men marvelled, saying, What manner of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him!"

The same winds that obeyed his rebuke in the boat is the same winds that night that were acting contrary that night. I believe the winds were responding to His turmoil on the mountain that night ... and he gets up and comes off that mountain and walks on the water to His beloved disciples and of course they are frightened and Peter bids Him ~ If it is really you LORD let me walk to you ... and he did, he got out of the boat and began to walk on the water ... can you imagine the feelings of Peter as he did this, the chatter behind him in the boat of the disciples ... "But when he [Peter] saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid ... "

The word "boisterous" there "ischyros" in greek means "of one who has strength of soul to sustain the attacks of Satan, strong and therefore exhibiting many excellences". In looking at the other uses in Scripture of this word translated "strong man", "mightier" (speaking of Jesus in comparison to John the Baptist), "the weakness of God is STRONGER than man" ... I see a very supernatural, spiritual thing going on here. Peter was seeing in Yeshua (Jesus) His Power, the power to overcome the wind and the laws of gravity, but even more so the POWER to overcome the evil one ... and Peter began to sink in fear and awe of this man who was more than a man. Peter saw his own depravity, for it is only in the face of Jesus that we see ourselves for who we really are and Peter cries out "LORD SAVE ME!"

Peter wanted to be saved that night in every since of the word ~ to rescue from danger or destruction, to save a suffering one (from perishing), to restore to health, to save in the technical biblical sense, to deliver from the penalties of the Messianic judgment, to save from the evils which obstruct the reception of the Messianic deliverance, to make whole, to make safe.

Salvation begins in this life in deliverance from error and corrupt notions, in moral purity, in pardon of sin, and in the blessed peace of a soul reconcilled to God, but on the visible return of Christ from heaven we will be perfected in consummate blessings.

And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Yĕhowshuwa` יהושוע: for he shall save his people from their sins. Matthew 1:21

For the Son of man is come to save that which was lost. Matthew 18:11

I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture. John 10:9

And it shall come to pass, [that] whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved. Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved. Acts 2:21, 4:12

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. Romans 10:9

For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob: For this [is] my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins. O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable [are] his judgments, and his ways past finding out! Romans 11:25-27, 33

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: [it is] the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. Ephesians 2:8-9

For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner: but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God; Who hath saved us, and called [us] with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began ... And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve [me] unto his heavenly kingdom: to whom [be] glory for ever and ever. Amen. I Timothy 1:7-9, II Timothy 4:18

Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us ... Titus 3:5

And immediately Jesus stretched forth [his] hand, and caught him [Peter], and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt? And when they were come into the ship, the wind (my interpretation: warfare) ceased (to cease from violence, from causing trouble, sorrow - like the sorrow Yeshua probably felt regarding John the Baptist). Matthew 14:31-32

Then they that were in the ship came and worshipped him, saying, Of a truth thou art the Son of God. v.33

[Afterwards] And when the men of that place [Gennesaret כנרות, in the Galilee region, a town and district in Naphtali] had knowledge of him, they sent out into all that country round about, and brought unto him all that were diseased; And besought him that they might only touch the hem (fringe; tassel; tzit-tzit) of his garment: and as many as touched were made perfectly whole (saved as Peter was in the boat).


O - Observations: (My Cliff Note version!)

WOW! What can be said about this passage and all the things going on ... The scene opens with John the Baptist's head on a platter and closes with the salvation of all those who came to Jesus for healing and a touch of the "hem of his garment", his tzit-tzit's. And in between all that you have this huge miracle of the feeding of the 5,000+ and the walking on the water in the midst of this tumultuous spiritual warfare going on as exhibited in the wind.


A - Application for me today:

Before coming to this passage today I had asked God for a sign that what I thought I was supposed to do in a certain area of my life was what He wanted me to do ... I didn't get my answer here as I thought I would ... but what an incredibly humbling passage nonetheless. What incredible things are going on that we normally would breeze through as a "nice story" ... This is a POWERFUL passage of SALVATION!!! Here we see Yehoshua (Jesus) in great spiritual warfare and Peter, I believe, seeing The Master for who He is, The One who has strength of soul to sustain the attacks of Satan, the Saviour! And as Jesus enters the boat the wind ceases and WORSHIP begins to take place ... all at about 3 or 4 in the morning ... in a boat ... in the water ... at the end of a very long day! Can you put yourself there today, in that boat, worshipping the Saviour, the Son of God!


P - Prayer in response:

Son of the Living God, SAVE ME! Make me whole ...



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